The history of the world is the recorded memory of the experience, around the world, of Homo sapiens. Ancient human history[1] begins with the invention, independently at several sites on Earth, of writing, which created the infrastructure for lasting, accurately transmitted memories and thus for the diffusion and growth of knowledge.[2][3] Nevertheless, an appreciation of the roots of civilization requires at least cursory consideration to humanity's prehistory.

One such epoch was the advent of the Agricultural Revolution.[4][5] Between 8,500 and 7,000 BCE, in the Fertile Crescent (a region in the Near East, incorporating the Levant and Mesopotamia), humans began the systematic husbandry of plants and animals — agriculture.[6] It spread to neighboring regions, and also developed independently elsewhere, until most Homo sapiens lived sedentary lives as farmers in permanent settlements[7] centered about life-sustaining bodies of water. These communities coalesced over time into increasingly larger units, in parallel with the evolution of ever more efficient means of transport.

The relative security and increased productivity provided by farming allowed these communities to expand. Surplus food made possible an increasing division of labor, the rise of a leisured upper class, and the development of cities and thus of civilization. The growing complexity of human societies necessitated systems of accounting; and from this evolved, beginning in the Bronze Age, writing.[8] The independent invention of writing at several sites on Earth allows a number of regions to claim to be cradles of civilization.

Some archeologists suggest, based on ongoing excavations of a temple complex at Göbekli Tepe ("Potbelly Hill") in southern Turkey, dating from ca. 11,500 years ago, that religion predated the Agricultural Revolution rather than following in its wake, as had generally been assumed.[35]

A state ordinarily needs an army for the legitimate exercise of force. An army needs a bureaucracy to maintain it. The only exception to this appears to have been the Indus Valley Civilization, for which there is no evidence of the existence of a military force.

The largest contiguous land empire in history was the 13th-century Mongolian Empire.[42][43] By then, most people in Europe, Asia and North Africa belonged to states. There were states as well in West Africa, Mexico and western South America. States controlled more and more of the world's territory and population; the last "empty" territories, with the exception of uninhabited Antarctica, would be divided up among states by the Berlin Conference (1884–1885).

City and trade

Agriculture also created, and allowed for the storage of, food surpluses that could support people not directly engaged in food production. The development of agriculture permitted the creation of the first cities. These were centers of trade, manufacture and political power with nearly no agricultural production of their own. Cities established a symbiosis with their surrounding countrysides, absorbing agricultural products and providing, in return, manufactures and varying degrees of military protection.[44][45][46]

In the west, the ancient Greeks established a civilization that is considered by most historians to be the foundational culture of modern western civilization. Some centuries later, in the 3rd century BCE, the Romans began expanding their territory through conquest and colonisation. By the reign of Emperor Augustus (late 1st century BCE), Rome controlled all the lands surrounding the Mediterranean. By the reign of Emperor Trajan (early 2nd century CE), Rome controlled much of the land from England to Mesopotamia.

The empires faced common problems associated with maintaining huge armies and supporting a central bureaucracy. These costs fell most heavily on the peasantry, while land-owning magnates were increasingly able to evade centralised control and its costs. The pressure of barbarians on the frontiers hastened the process of internal dissolution. China's Han Empire fell into civil war in 220 CE, while its Roman counterpart became increasingly decentralised and divided about the same time.

In these times, northern India was ruled by the Guptas. In southern India, three prominent Dravidian kingdoms emerged: Cheras, Cholas and Pandyas. The ensuing stability contributed to heralding in the golden age of Hindu culture in the 4th and 5th centuries CE.

This period in the history of the world was marked by slow but steady technological advances, with important developments such as the stirrup and moldboard plow arriving every few centuries. There were, however, in some regions, periods of rapid technological progress. Most important, perhaps, was the Mediterranean area during the Hellenistic period, when hundreds of technologies were invented.[89][90][91] Such periods were followed by periods of technological decay, as during the Roman Empire's decline and fall and the ensuing early medieval period.

The Black Death was one of the deadliest pandemics in human history. Starting in Asia, the disease reached Mediterranean and western Europe during the late 1340s,[101] and killed tens of millions of Europeans in six years; between a third and a half of the total population.[102]

The Middle Ages[103] witnessed the first sustained urbanization of northern and western Europe. Many modern European states owe their origins to events unfolding in the Middle Ages; present European political boundaries are, in many regards, the result of the military and dynastic achievements during this tumultuous period.[104]

Modern history

Modern history (the "modern period," the "modern era," "modern times") is history of the period following the Middle Ages. "Contemporary history" encompasses historic events that are immediately relevant to the present time; its intentionally loose ambit includes major events such as World War II, but not those whose immediate effects have dissipated.

Many have also argued that Europe's institutions were superior,[127][128] that property rights and free-market economics were stronger than elsewhere due to an ideal of freedom peculiar to Europe. In recent years, however, scholars such as Kenneth Pomeranz have challenged this view, although the revisionist approach to world history has also met with criticism for systematically "downplaying" European achievements.[129]

Geography also contributed to important geopolitical differences. For most of their histories, China, India and the Middle East were each unified under a single dominant power that expanded until it reached the surrounding mountains and deserts. In 1600 the Ottoman Empire[131] controlled almost all the Middle East, the Ming Dynasty ruled China,[132][133] and the Mughal Empire held sway over India. By contrast, Europe was almost always divided into a number of warring states. Pan-European empires, with the notable exception of the Roman Empire, tended to collapse soon after they arose. Another doubtless important geographic factor in the rise of Europe was the Mediterranean Sea, which, for millennia, had functioned as a maritime superhighway fostering the exchange of goods, people, ideas and inventions.

This had dramatic effects on both continents. The Europeans brought with them viral diseases that American natives had never encountered,[139] and uncertain numbers of natives died in a series of devastating epidemics. The Europeans also had the technological advantage of horses, steel and guns that helped them overpower the Aztec and Incan empires as well as North American cultures.[140]

Gold and resources from the Americas began to be stripped from the land and people and shipped to Europe, while at the same time large numbers of European colonists began to emigrate to the Americas.[141][142] To meet the great demand for labor in the new colonies, the mass import of Africans as slaves began.[143] Soon much of the Americas had a large racial underclass of slaves. In West Africa, a series of thriving states developed along the coast, becoming prosperous from the exploitation of suffering interior African peoples.

Meanwhile the voyages of Admiral Zheng He were halted by China's Ming Dynasty (1368–1644), established after the expulsion of the Mongols. A Chinese commercial revolution, sometimes described as "incipient capitalism", was also abortive. The Ming Dynasty would eventually fall to the Manchus, whose Qing Dynasty at first oversaw a period of calm and prosperity but would increasingly fall prey to Western encroachment.

19th century

After Europeans had achieved dominance over the Americas, their imperial appetites turned to the countries of Asia. In the 19th century the European states had a distinct technological advantage over Asian states and peoples.[citation needed] Britain gained control of the Indian subcontinent, Egypt and the Malay Peninsula;[citation needed] the French took Indochina;[citation needed] while the Dutch cemented their control over the Dutch East Indies.[citation needed] In addition, Russia colonised large pre-agricultural areas of Siberia.[citation needed] The British also colonised places inhabited by Neolithic peoples, including Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. large numbers of British colonists emigrated to these colonies.[citation needed] In the late 19th century, the European powers divided the remaining areas of Africa.[citation needed] Within Europe, economic and military challenges created a system of nation states, and ethno-linguistic groupings began to identify themselves as distinctive nations with aspirations for cultural and political autonomy.[citation needed] This nationalism would become important to peoples across the world in the twentieth century.[citation needed]

This era in European culture saw the Age of Reason lead to the Scientific Revolution. The Scientific Revolution changed humanity's understanding of the world and happened simultaneously with the Industrial Revolution, a major transformation of the world's economies.[citation needed] The Industrial Revolution began in Great Britain[citation needed] and used new modes of production — the factory, mass production, and mechanisation — to manufacture a wide array of goods faster and using less labour than previously.[citation needed]

During the Industrial Revolution, the world economy became reliant on coal as a fuel[citation needed], as new methods of transport, such as railways and steamships, effectively shrank the world.[citation needed] Meanwhile, industrial pollution and environmental damage, present since the discovery of fire and the beginning of civilization, accelerated drastically.[citation needed]

20th century to present

Early 20th century

The 20th century[145][146][147] opened with Europe at an apex of wealth and power, and with much of the world under its direct colonial control or its indirect domination.[148] Much of the rest of the world was influenced by heavily Europeanized nations: the United States and Japan.[149] As the century unfolded, however, the global system dominated by rival powers was subjected to severe strains, and ultimately yielded to a more fluid structure of independent nations organized on Western models.

Following World War II, in 1945, the United Nations was founded in the hope of allaying conflicts among nations and preventing future wars.[158][159] The war had, however, left two nations, the United States[160] and the Soviet Union, with principal power to guide international affairs.[161] Each was suspicious of the other and feared a global spread of the other's political-economic model. This led to the Cold War, a forty-year stand-off between the United States, the Soviet Union, and their respective allies. With the development of nuclear weapons[162] and the subsequent arms race, all of humanity were put at risk of nuclear war between the two superpowers.[163] Such war being viewed as impractical, proxy wars were instead waged, at the expense of non-nuclear-armed Third World countries.

Late 20th century

The Cold War lasted through to the ninth decade of the twentieth century, when the Soviet Union's communist system began to collapse, unable to compete economically with the United States and western Europe; the Soviets' Central European "satellites" reasserted their national sovereignty, and in 1991 the Soviet Union itself disintegrated.[164][165][166] The United States for the time being was left as the "sole remaining superpower".[167][168][169]

Notes

^ Crawford, O. G. S. (1927). Antiquity. [Gloucester, Eng.]: Antiquity Publications [etc.]. (cf., History education in the United States is primarily the study of the written past. Defining history in such a narrow way has important consequences ...)

^ According to David Diringer ("Writing", Encyclopedia Americana, 1986 ed., vol. 29, p. 558), "Writing gives permanence to men's knowledge and enables them to communicate over great distances.... The complex society of a higher civilization would be impossible without the art of writing."

^ "Early Modern," historically speaking, refers to Western European history from 1501 (after the widely accepted end of the Late Middle Ages; the transition period was the 15th century) to either 1750 or circa 1790–1800, by which ever epoch is favored by a school of scholars defining the period—which, in many cases of periodization, differs as well within a discipline such as art, philosophy or history.

^ The Encyclopedia Americana; a library of universal knowledge. (1918). New York: Encyclopedia Americana Corp. Page 539 (cf., The European Renaissance which flourished from the 14th to the 16th century [...])

^ Associated Institution for the Study and Presentation of Arab Cultural Values, Cairo, and United Arab Republic. Islamic and Arab Contribution to the European Renaissance. Cairo: General Egyptian Book Organization, 1977. Page 243.

^ Etemad, B. (2007). Possessing the world: taking the measurements of colonisation from the eighteenth to the twentieth century. European expansion and global interaction, v. 6. New York: Berghahn Books.

^ After 1970s, the United States superpower status has came into question as that country's economic supremacy began to show signs of slippage. For more see, McCormick, T. J. (1995). America's half-century: United States foreign policy in the Cold War and after. The American moment. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Page 155

References

Williams, H. S. (1904). The historians' history of the world; a comprehensive narrative of the rise and development of nations as recorded by over two thousand of the great writers of all ages. New York: The Outlook Company; [etc].